AIDA-2020 brought together the leading European infrastructures and academic institutions in detector development for particle physics, regrouping more than 10,000 scientists. 19 countries and CERN were involved in this programme aligned with the European Strategy for Particle Physics.
With the upgrade of the LHC and its experiments, the community had to overcome unprecedented challenges, which AIDA-2020 addressed. AIDA-2020 advanced detector technologies beyond previous limits by offering well-equipped test beam and irradiation facilities for testing detector systems under its TA programme. Common software tools, microelectronics chips and DAQ systems were also provided. These shared high-quality infrastructures and standards ensured a coherent development by involving experts across Europe.
The enhanced coordination within the European detector community leveraged EU and national resources and contributed to maintaining Europe's leadership in the field.